Green and Grey
by Moo Chapman
Summary: AU. Oliver returned to Starling to save his city, when on the second day of his return he is saved himself by a woman wearing a familiar, if slightly different hood, he knows thing are not as he planed She failed this city, she failed its Hero. This time Felicity Smoak would get it right. Series rewite (redo time travel)
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I Don't own it, or you would have seen this on screen.

With heartfelt thanks to my beta reader arrow-through-my-writers-block

Chapter One.

Oliver panted and ran through the forest, pushing away some branches and running through others, speed was the only concern, the destination; his only focus. With a sure leap, Oliver launched himself from the midpoint of a boulder, barely a hindrance at just slightly taller than himself, to a low hanging tree branch. A swing of his weight drove the castaway through the air, landing him safe beyond the boulder.

Oliver was quickly closing on his destination, the point of his focus, and though the rocky terrain demanded that the pace slow he pushed on fast still. He would not let this chance pass him by. He was going home.

All but running up a sheer rock face, Oliver found the view from the top was unobstructed. A fishing boat just a short way off the islands craggy coastline. Salvation in sight he pushed on, leaping from the boulder that they had just climbed to another, so close now. A short run across a plateau and a jump and he was once more amongst the scrub wood, and the runner moved quickly to the place the bow was carefully covered and protected from the elements. He stabbed his knife into a crack in the stone and uncovered the bow and the purpose built flint arrow that would light his signal fire and get him home.

With quick, decided movements Oliver took up the bow and flint arrow which he struck on the steel blade of his knife and took aim. Oliver loosed the arrow which carried his best hope of returning home.

The arrow's flight was true. It hit its target, igniting the fuel and sending a pillar of orange flame high for the crew of the little fishing boat to see.

After just a moment of observation proved that the fishing boat was turning toward the island.

"**The name of the island they found me on is Lian Yu."**

Two Asian fishermen landed on the island and made their way across the rocky beach, passing the rather intimidating red and black mask mounted on a wooden stake with an arrow through its eye. The older man led the way.  
><strong>"It's mandarin for 'Purgatory.' I've been stranded here for I've dreamt of my rescue every cold black night since then."<strong>

Oliver walked toward the two men . He dropped to his knees in a very controlled movement, relief and gratitude, perhaps even a little nervousness flooding him and pushed back his hood.

**"For 5 years, I have had only one thought, one goal survive. Survive and one day return home."**

****The fishermen were gracious hosts, though their little vessel had little in the way of amenities; they did all that they could to make Oliver comfortable. They seemed like good, hard working men and Oliver decided on the spot to what he could for them when he got home.

"**The island held many dangers.  
>To live, I had to make myself more than what I was, to forge myself into a weapon.<br>I am returning not the boy who was shipwrecked but the man who will bring justice to those who have poisoned my city."**

"**My name is Oliver Queen."**

Smoak and Fyre Entertainment Complex

"Oliver Queen is alive. The Starling City resident was found by fishermen in the North China sea and presumed dead following the accident at sea which claimed _The Queen's Gambit _. Queen was a regular tabloid presence and a fixture at the Starling City club scene. Shortly before his disappearance, he was acquitted of assault charges stemming from a highly publicized drunken altercation with paparazzi. Queen is the son of Starling City billionaire Robert Queen, who was also on board but now officially confirmed as deceased."

Felicity looked up from the desk smiled at the news bulletin; he was back. She would 'meet' him soon.

And this time she wouldn't fail him

She had spent years setting up her own little empire, and carefully hiding it behind the shield of one business venture after another. _Smoak and Fyre _started as a single piece of freeware that became by subscription, and then expanded to a handful of games. This brought her a tidy sum, which was folded into _S&F Investments_; with the knowledge that he had brought back with her she had been able to turn her tidy little sum into a near embarrassing fortune. _S&F Entertainment_ was her latest venture; she had built it to hide her lair. The arcade, indoor go-kart track, laser tag and indoor paintball combat arena. Below all this was a purpose built, super-secret hero HQ.

Her beautiful, custom built babies and the server towers their dedicated cooling system. She had backup generators, a security system that she had spent untold hours perfecting. Her lair was perfect right down to its location, backing on to the Queen foundry.

She had been training for this since the day the project worked, since she awoke in the body of her twelve year old self. She had spent twenty years working on the project.

Ever since that night, ever since she failed him, failed their city, she had been trying to find a way to undo her mistake. It is a hard thing to live with the death of the man you love on your hands. Knowing that you allowed half a city to die, is nothing to knowing that in doing so, you failed the man you love, that he could have gladly gone to his death if he had known that their city was safe.

Oliver wouldn't blame her for his death. Sometimes that made it worse.

Hospital

Oliver stood at the ready while staring out the Hospital window at his city. The city he would fight. The City he would save.

Standing outside Oliver's room, Moira and Dr. Lamb looked in at him as the doctor described Oliver's condition to his mother.

"Twenty percent of his body is covered in scar tissue. Second-degree burns on his back and arms X-rays show at least twelve that never properly healed." Lamb had been treating Oliver and the rest of the Queen family for many years and it broke his heart to think of what this young man before him must have gone through in just five short years.

"Has he said anything about what happened?" Moira's voice shook just slightly as she asked, turning to look at her family's trusted doctor, though she was loathed to take her eyes off her son for even that short time.

"No," Dr. Lamb was truly sorry he couldn't give Moira any good news "He's barely said anything." She turned away from him and looked back toward her son. "Moira, I'd like you to prepare yourself. The Oliver you lost might not be the one they found." Her hand was already on the doorknob and Lamb couldn't be sure if the woman had actually heard his warning. 

Moira opened the door to Oliver's room and stepped in. She had heard Dr. Lamb's warning and while she knew that Oliver wasn't going to be the same boy, she was sure that after a few days things would go back to how they had been. All that mattered was that she had her son back and everything else, all the uncomfortable and sticky questions, could wait.

"Oliver?" For a moment after Moira had spoken her boy didn't seem to react. Then he turned to face her. 

Oliver's eyes glistened brightly, perhaps with restrained happy tears as he fought to stay calm. "Mom." The word was really all that was needed.

He moved to her, without the enthusiasm that Moira had hoped for, but it was enough for now. "Oh, my beautiful boy." She embraced her son and he her. Five years was too long for a mother to be separated from her child. Their embrace lasted a good long time until Oliver broke it to ask about his little sister. Which in turn led to another subject and they talked until Dr. Lamb came in and told Moira it was time to let Oliver rest. She could take him home in the morning after the last of his tests came back. 

Oliver didn't really try to sleep, nor did he actively try to stay awake. The Hospital was loud and the scents too strong that here was very little chance that he would be able to get any real sleep there. He was able to get short stretches of sleep but nothing substantive. Mostly he refined his plans.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

**Queen Manor**

Oliver allowed his mother to lead him into the manor. He was fairly sure that he had made a poor show on the ride out of the city, and his insistence on carrying his own 'luggage' hadn't helped.

"Your room is exactly as you left it," Moira announced as she opened both of the front doors, proceeding without pause to the foyer table and sorting out her belongings from her clutch, "I never had the heart to change a thing."

"Oliver," an accented voice greeted, as a bald besuited black man approached him. "It's damn good to see you." Oliver knew who he was and why his was here in the manor at a time when only family should be, but he wasn't supposed to know so he played dumb. The opportunity to snub the man who had stepped in to his father's place was just a bonus. "It's Walter, Walter Steele."

"You remember Walter, your father's friend from the company." Oliver noted that his mother had still said nothing to explain the change in her relationship with the man, but the man in front of him lost his attention as he saw movement over his shoulder.

Oliver brushed past the man he hardly remembered and walked directly to the woman that had fed him and cared for him all of his life; this woman was family.

"It's good to see you, Raisa." His smile was restrained but he reached and clasped both of her hands in his.

"Welcome home, Mr. Oliver," Raisa spoke her American influenced Russian accent filled him with a sense of _home_ the way the actual house had failed to do. "Mr. Merlyn phoned, he wants to join you for dinner." Raisa addressed her employer over the shoulder of her returned son.

"Wonderful." Oliver had returned his attention to his mother, in order to ask if the Mister Merlyn in question was his long time best friend or the somewhat neglectful Merlyn senior, but was distracted by the sound of someone moving about upstairs. It had to be her; it had to be his baby sister. Oliver had seen photos of her but he knew nothing about the person that she had become besides the fact that she had followed in his footsteps, when it came to making trouble. "Oliver? Did you hear that?"

Oliver no longer cared what his mother was talking about. As he released Raisa's hands, all he could see was his little Speedy coming down the stairs. He reached the foot just as his sister came around the landing.

"Hey, sis," Oliver smiled up at the girl that was now near to grown.

"I knew it," Thea exclaimed with happy little gasps, while she ran down the stairs. "I knew you were alive." She leapt from the final step into her brother's arms. "I missed you so much."

"You were with me the whole time," Oliver whispered, holding tight to Thea. Even though the idea of Thea on the island turned his stomach.

* * *

><p>The sounds and scents of the Manor hadn't changed, but some things had though. Little things. The addition of a painting here, a different carpet there, new photos intermixed amongst those that Oliver remembered.<p>

Over the last five years Oliver had walked through the Manor many times in his mind. On the table, Oliver knew he would find a photograph of himself and his father taken when he was a small boy. Oliver picked up the photo he didn't remember though he had been told that the photo was taken while on some holiday. He remembered his mother saying that they had so much fun, but the photo brought nothing to mind except the deep sorrow and guilt he always felt at the loss of his father.

The front door swung open without any request for entry. "What did I tell you?" Oliver looked up from the photo with a very small smile on his lips. "Yachts suck." Oliver replaced the photo and turned to greet his old friend.

"Tommy Merlyn." Oliver embraced the man who was as near to a brother that he ever had.

"I missed you, buddy."

* * *

><p>"Ok," Tommy exclaimed, reaching for his wine glass again "What else did you miss? Super bowl winners: Giants, Steelers, Saints, Packers, Giants again." Emphasizing his point with the other hand and not minding the napkin still clutched in it "A black president, that's new. Oh, and <em>'Lost,'<em> they were all dead I think." All the while Oliver waited for his mother to tell him that she had remarried; she was doing a very poor job of hiding her relationship if she didn't intend to tell him.

"What was it like there?" Thea, more outgoing and always fearless when it comes to her brother, asked the question that they had all wanted to but hadn't dared. The whole table stopped and turned, not sure of Oliver's reaction and certainly not wanting to miss any answer that he might give.

"Cold," Oliver replied after a moment's pause.

"Tomorrow, you and me, we're doing the city. You've got a lot to catch up on," Tommy jumped in quickly to save any awkwardness this time having forsaken his napkin for a fork.

"That sounds like a great idea," Moira added from the far side of the table. Oliver couldn't help but wonder if his mother thought he would just become the boy that he was after just one wild night on the town with his old friend.

"Good. Then I was hoping to swing by the office," Oliver announced, hoping that the words would put a stop to those thoughts. The reaction was immediate. Walter stopped with his wine glass nearly to his mouth, and Moira near to choked on the mouthful that she had just taken.

"Well, there's plenty of time for all that," Walter placated as both he and Moira gently set down their wine glasses. "Queen Consolidated isn't going anywhere." Oliver nodded at the man seated next to his mother.

The soft thud beside Oliver alerted him to the fact that Raisa's foot had caught the edge of the rug. In one quick movement, Oliver put out one hand to catch Raisa, saving her from falling in to the table, and his other hand came up to catch the bowl

"Oh, I am so sorry, Mr. Oliver." Oliver smiles and reassures her that all is well. It is Raisa's astonished look that first clued Oliver in that there was something in his words that he should not have said.

"Dude, you speak Russian?" Tommy's utter and undisguised shock was the second clue. Oliver took in the table's reaction: his Mother looked to Walter as though he had all the answers to all the universe's questions. He still couldn't believe that they hadn't told him.

"I didn't realize you took Russian at college, Oliver," Walter asked in a statement. Oliver decided to use the fact that they had yet to be told the truth of their relationship to take a dig at his stepfather.

"I didn't realize you wanted to sleep with my mother, Walter," Oliver replied with the same polite smile that he had been using with the man since he had greeted him at the door. The table was silent for a couple of beats

"I didn't say anything." The response of a younger sibling, denying their part in some trouble.

"She didn't have to." Oliver wasn't going to let Thea be blamed for the fact that his mother and her second husband were blatantly obvious. Moira nodded and reached over and took Walter's hand in her own.

"Oliver, Walter and I are married," Moira stated. "And I don't want you to think that either one of us did anything to disrespect your father."

"We both believed that Robert, like you, was, uh, well, gone," Walter jumped in, taking over.

"It's fine." Oliver gave a small nod trying to reassure them all was well, and it was really, he had only been upset that he hadn't been told. Oliver pushed himself up. "May I be excused?" he waits for a response, and gets a nod

"Hey, don't forget about tomorrow, buddy," Tommy reminds and as acknowledgement a pat on the shoulder.

* * *

><p>The storm could not have hit Starling at a worse time. Oliver had been asleep for just over an hour and was hitting his REM cycle, so of course the sounds of the light summer tempest outside of the stone walls of Queen Manor had taken him back to the squall that had taken down the <em>Queens Gambit.<em>

There was little chance of the rain from the open window waking Oliver; he had slept through far worse in the last five years. Moira's entrance was utterly unnoticed by her sleeping son.

"Oliver." Moira reached out and place her hand on her sleeping son's shoulder. "Wake up. Oliver?" Oliver in his sleep addled state with every sense telling him that he was in danger. He reacted as his training dictated.

Oliver used his mother's arm as a lever and flipped her onto her back and brought the outside of his palm down on his her throat.

"Oliver!" Walter yelled. Getting in his face, the older man's actions were enough to snap Oliver out of his reactionary haze. But it still took him a moment to look down and see what he had done.

Oliver all but jumped away from his mother, dragging himself across the floor until he was well out of arm's reach and shielding his mother from himself by holding tight to a chair. "I'm sorry, I'm so... I'm so sorry." He couldn't believe what he had just done; it was pure luck that he hadn't just killed his mother. On the other hand, his estimation of Walter went up tenfold as he first pulled Moira to her feet and away and then at her urging helped her to lower herself the ground as she moved toward her son as one would a frightened and dangerous dog.

"Oh, it's ok, Oliver. It's all right, sweetheart. You're home," she reassured him, reaching one arm out across the floor in an offer for him to take it, but with care not to startle him again. "You're home."

* * *

><p>He was not having the greatest of mornings, first seeing signs that his little sister was using drugs, then his best friend telling him that he thought that said little sister was hot. His encounter with Laurel had gone just as he feared that it would and to top it all off now he has watched a man die and allowed himself and his best friend to be abducted.<p>

"Mr. Queen!" One of his abductors yelled through his mask, and pulled the hood from Oliver's head. "Did your father survive that accident?" His abductors were all wearing red skull demon masks. With a quick glance Oliver saw two more of them, and Tommy laying tied on a packing pallet. His interrogator waved a sparking stun gun in front of Oliver, regaining his attention. "I ask the questions. You give me the answers."

Oliver started to work his way free of his restraints. His interrogator turned to his partner and held out his arms in a 'what's a guy to do' way jammed the sparking stun gun into Oliver's chest. He cried out, the voltage had been fiddled with, and while it did hurt, Oliver could bear far worse. "Did he make it to the island? Did he tell you anything?" Another application of the stun gun. Oliver faked breaking, because if he didn't this amateur might accidently cause some real damage.

"Yes, he did."

"What did he tell you, Mr. Queen?" The fool was bobbing about like a bobble head trying to be intimidating.

Oliver sent a quick glance Tommy's way to make sure that his friend was still out before he made his move. "He told me I'm gonna kill you." This elected laughter from all three abductors.

"You're delusional. You're zip-cuffed to that chair." His captor made the mistake of getting right in his face to say this, and it was going to be the last mistake that he made.

"Not anymore."

Oliver, free of his restraints and about to attack, was completely shocked as an arrow point broke through the shoulder of his interrogator. Blue sparks of electricity crackled from the arrow shaft to the head. The masked man fell to the ground just as a second arrow hit the floor a good five feet from where Tommy lay restrained. The arrow bleached pale grey smoke obscuring Tommy from sight, and thus all sight from Tommy.

Oliver looked up to where the arrows where coming from, and saw the silhouette of a hooded archer. For a moment he thought that he was seeing Shado, until a beam of light broke through and illuminated the woman standing in the warehouse rafters, showing a thick blonde braid hanging across the front of her shoulder.

Oliver watched the archer take aim and loose a third arrow and turned just in time to see it pass through the lower leg of the second masked man. The third was apparently marginally brighter and ran, though he only got a few feet before an arrow pierced through his ankle.

Oliver quickly moved through his captors and disarmed them. Each of the men that had been electrocuted was unconscious. The third man was groaning and clutching his leg and staring at the arrow that had penetrated his ankle.

The archer fired an arrow into the shadows of the ceiling. Oliver heard it hit and stick in a steel girder. The arrow was apparently similar to one that Oliver had designed, for grappling and letdown. The archer launched her herself out on the rope and made her way to Oliver's side.

"You will tell me who hired you to abduct Mr. Queen." The archer's voice was hidden by a modulator, but it was still clearly female. She was wearing his hood, the one that had been Yeo Fai's and Shado's, only this one was dark grey, but in every other detail it was exact. "If you do this, I will be merciful."

"Then he'll kill me." the man said

"No, first he'll find someone you care about and kill them, but if you tell me, I'll just kill you." Electronically altered or not, Oliver could hear anger in the woman's voice.

"You don't have to do this."

"You killed that man when you took me. You didn't have to do that." Oliver didn't hide his anger as he stepped toward the man, the archer put out her bow to stop him. The bow was a work of art, custom made from the little of it he had seen.

"I never got a name, they call him the Grizzled Man." The archer's hood tipped to the side.

"Thank you, your information is appreciated." The archer took a lancet from her gauntlet and with a flick of the wrist embedded it in the man's thigh. The thug barely had a moment to cry out before he fell into unconsciousness.

"You didn't kill him," Oliver stated.

"I have blood on my hands; I do my best not to add any more," She said and reached up to pull off her hood, her blonde hair pulled into a messy braid leaving wisps to fall across her masked face. Oliver wondered at this woman, why she had come to save him, how was it she was wearing a copy of his hood and why was she baring herself to him. She reached up and pulled the mask off her face. She was beautiful. "I know you have questions Oliver, and I will answer what I can, but the younger Mister Merlyn will be coming to any moment. I think that it best I not be here. Say there was a man with me." She pulled up her hood and ran off. Oliver considered running after her and finding out what the hell was going on but she was right, Tommy would be conscious soon.

"Tommy?" Oliver called faking panic, and ran to where his best friend was tied. He pulled the still lazily smoking arrow from the floor and threw it across the room trying to fan the cover smoke from the air.

"What the hell?" Tommy asked blurrily.


End file.
